Tuesday, April 27, 2010

New growth, sustainable living, recycling, environmentally friendly, and jealousy. That last one has spawned the tiniest bit of envy and sadness of lacking into centuries and centuries and centuries of hard feelings, thinking, action and consequences. A hard concept to grasp is that one's feeling of jealousy exists and is known to only the person who is feeling it, yet it is a universal emotion that is felt by anyone who is human. When a person with the jealous feelings tries to convey it to someone else, especially to the subject who is envied (better quality of life) or who is the object of the jealousy (possible or genuinely strong feelings for someone else), it is difficult for the receiver to relate to the reality of that feeling. Yet it can be so profoundly present in the jealous person's mind. It can consume that person until there is nothing left for that person to think about. Often the qualities or state of life the other person is jealous about are created from sources, events and experiences of which the jealous person has no concept. I read something like that once. Does thinking about such things help when I feel jealous? Not especially. What helps is thinking about all the good things I have that I like about myself and my situation, and thinking that I am glad to be where I am and be who I am.

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

This morning I was wide awake at 2 a.m., perhaps anticipating that I would have to be awake today earlier than usual (but not that early). I was hungry, my knee hurt (bad jumping decision about one month ago), and then the automatic sensor light over the driveway turned itself on and illuminated the place where I sleep. I looked out the window. In front of it, near where my hand landed, was a book, "Pride and Prejudice," that I purchased for 50 cents at a book sale at the public library about three weeks ago (50 percent off sale!). This weekend, I finally watched a movie about Jane Austen's life, and, after watching it a few times repeatedly in various parts because I kept falling asleep, realized I had never read any of Jane Austen's six novels and then set out a plan to find one (perhaps in my own home). Then I realized early this morning that I had just bought one. So I began reading. I managed to get to page 11, and then the sleepiness crept back in. Despite its sedative effect, I do want to read more.

Friday, April 9, 2010

At a library book sale last week, at which I arrived about three minutes before its closing time, I picked up a Sophocles book and randomly read the page I turned to. It was a poem that lamented that, at least in my interpretation, the moment of an event is far shorter than the effect it has on a person's mind. I thought about all the time spent dissecting all the momentary incidents, short relationships, and longer relationships I've had and realized how true it was. I've been thinking about that very short moment of reading the line in that poem and I've been thinking about how long I've spent thinking about its implications. So true, so simple, and so strange. All those things that happen to us, momentary or not, make up the intricate structure of who we are. And then I was thinking about how long ago that little line was written, and how long that thought must have been going around.

Thursday, April 1, 2010

How to Train a Dragon ... now I know, after watching this computer-animated adventure movie, which I was ushered into with comments like, "It's not JUST a kids' movie," and "it was better than Alice," what it's like to fly with one and make it my pet ... just like having a cat except that it flies. Like a cat, it purrs, offers love, communicates with its eyes, circles around to find a comfortable spot to sleep, eats fish and protects me from other creatures. I felt a little seasick on one part, and felt things coming right at me with alarming speed. It was a good ride, though, and having low expectations for a movie always makes it better. Halfway through the movie, things were going very well for the protagonist, and I wondered for awhile when the conflict, chaos and near-tragedy would begin. It finally came and of course everything worked out pretty much for the best. And, I didn't fall asleep as I did when I watched that Alice movie.